He had a weapon, it wasn’t until it was examined that it proved to be ‘unviable’

If you followed the argument that you shouldn’t arrest someone (who don’t forget in has history of owning an illegal firearm, using it to kill and had boasted to a reporter he had another weapon) with what looks like a gun because it may be a toy or unviable then no one would be arrested.

He is still a convicted criminal after all. The manslaughter charge still stands. In my view, clearly not shared universally, the police would have been negligent not to follow up the report.

“It is interesting tho’ unsurprising, that your imagination should lead you in this way”
I suggest a mirror may be of use John

Is that the same Allison Pearson who was declared bankrupt in November 2015.

Hardly the best person to be commenting on numeracy standards of any sort I would think. Perhaps she should have got her mother to do her sums for her? But then, of course, she went to a comprehensive! It must have held her back! Oh, she got into Cambridge, perhaps it wasn’t so bad after all.

Edit: I should say at this point that I am not mocking bankruptcy per se, this is a dreadful thing to happen to any one.
But if it is indeed because she didn’t sort out her tax, it is rather indicative of trying to buck the system.

From the Indy

A bankrupt opinion-maker

Allison Pearson, an eminent newspaper columnist, makes no bones about whose side she is on. “Those of us who voted for this Government need no convincing that our morbidly obese welfare budget requires drastic slimming,” she wrote in The Daily Telegraph in October.

A slimmed-down welfare budget would, of course, reduce the tax burden borne by high earners who do not qualify for welfare.

Ms Pearson was born in 1960 and lives in a village in South Cambridgeshire. I have before me a bankruptcy order agreed by the High Court last month. The petition was lodged by HM Revenue and Customs, which implies that it involves unpaid tax. The person declared bankrupt is identified as Allison Pearson, born in 1960, living in a Cambridgeshire village, whose occupation is “freelance journalist”.

So come on George Osborne: get the welfare bill down, cut the tax rate for the highest earners, and give Ms Pearson a chance to sort out her affairs.

Also her suggestion in the article that “if only children private schools had been tested the result would have been near the top” is quite out of date and funny especially in the light of the recent report by the Good school Guide
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35511564

Are you aware of when the OECD survey was conducted?

As a kid I always liked the look of the Czech LT vz 38 that became the Panzer 38(t)
As mentioned above, it wasn’t it’s armour or gun or crew layout that made it a very effective light tank in the early campaigns indeed it had failings in each of these areas, but it’s essential relaiblity and ease of maintenance endeared it to it’s crews earlier in the war.

Once it’s inadequacies as a battle tank had been exposed it’s excellent chassis was used in the Marder and Hetzer ‘tank destroyers’

CD, I was using “effective” as shorthand for what I think you mean e.g. That the T34 was relatively easy to produce in the vast numbers required, efficient, mostly reliable in the conditions it was designed for , and eminently suited to the tactics and terrain in which it was used. Was it the ‘best tank’? Not really in any one of the areas of easiest to crew, most effective mounted weapon, etc.

Perhaps we should have a go at tank Top Trumps.

The Sherman, when effectively crewed,using tactics suitable for it’s strengths was a very useful weapons system but as with the T34 it’s principle advantage over it’s opposition was arguably the large numbers available

It could be argued that it was the Russians who produced the most effective tank of the war in the T34 as they had embraced Christie’s suspension design with adequate armour, a diesel engine and a good gun.
If the US or the UK had taken on board some of Christie’s concepts in the twenties/early thirties they may have had more effective equipment earlier.

So, being on the right automatically leads to excellence?

Hmmmm. That it tends to make people self-serving and self-important I’d agree with, but automatically ‘excellent”? No

Those qualities undoubtedly make people very ‘successful’ in some areas, usually at the expense of others, but it sure doesn’t automatically make them people who are good.

And in addition, making loads of money makes you excellent does it?

In some cases I would agree that it can make people become a force for good, such as Bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffett or Mark Zuckerberg but in most cases it just seems to make one objectionable e.g. Michael O’Leary, Rupert Murdoch or Lord Archer.

Perhaps now is not the right time to bring this up, so I’ll say no more

And then you……#17

I think there’s going to be repucussions for the pilots at places like Duxford and particularly Old Warden.

Talk of increasing the number of hours on type and extra DA approvals for differnt types means some types may be unflyable.
Some Old Warden display pilots have minutes on type.

How’s this going to work…

Unless I have misread the publication, it is talking about number of hours relevant to the type to be displayed, not specific hours on each type. The DA will be determined by a judgement on the pilots ability and experience as before in each category. Most Of the collection’s aircraft will come in a single category, with a few in the higher powered/weight category? Those aircraft with minutes of flying time per year at Old Warden are flown by pilots with far greater hours than outlined.
Of more significance perhaps is whether people like Gene DeMarco and Steve Hinton have EU Medical Authorisation